I am pleased to provide opening comments for Bill 18 on behalf of the Legislative Assembly Board of Management. Bill 18 will amend the Legislative Assembly and Executive Council Act to revise the electoral districts of the Northwest Territories. In keeping with direction provided by Committee of the Whole of this Assembly on November 5, 2013, the bill proposes changes to the electoral boundaries within the communities of Hay River, Inuvik and Yellowknife, and moves the areas of Lutselk’e, Fort Resolution, Detah and Ndilo to a new Tu Nedhe and Weledeh electoral district. The status quo is maintained in the remaining seven constituencies. Bill 18 does not propose any increase to the number of MLAs in the Legislative Assembly.

On May 29, 2013, the report of the Electoral Boundaries Commission, 2012-2013, was tabled in this House. On behalf of the Board of Management and, indeed, all Members, I would like to thank the commission, consisting of the Honourable Justice Shannon Smallwood, Mr. Charles Furlong and Mr. Ian McCrea, for their hard work and thoughtful recommendations.

Once the commission’s report was tabled, the Legislative Assembly and all Members individually spent considerable time analyzing its recommendations. On November 5, 2013, a lengthy debate took place in Committee of the Whole. A motion was carried for the Board of Management to bring forward legislation to implement the 19 electoral districts recommendation of the Electoral Boundaries Commission, with an adjustment to the Kam Lake and Yellowknife South electoral district boundaries to more evenly distribute the

populations between those two districts. Bill 18 implements this direction.

That concludes my opening comments on Bill 18.